The Oaxaca Valley, located in the state of Oaxaca in Southern Mexico, was the site of the Zapotec civilization and its now famous capital, Monte Albán. This site, with political, military, and economic influence and control, helped to consolidate the three arms of the Oaxaca Valley, resulting in a state-level...
In light of broadening racial/ethnic educational attainment gaps, growing diversity within young populations, and the increasingly critical relationship between higher education and outcomes in adulthood, understanding the factors that shape educational attainment is an especially important task for research. With this goal in mind, the current study examined how national...
Mary Collins composed the award-winning book American Idle in 2009 after her recovery from an awful bicycle accident. This bicycle accident inspired Mary Collins to take a trip of discovery. Mary Collins visited historical locations to see changes in peoples’ physical activity over time. Collins interviewed individuals whose professions varied...
The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is a formidable international force operating and perpetuating religious, military, and violent agendas. In 2014, ISIS established a worldwide Caliphate governing religious authority across Middle Eastern territories. ISIS operations are grandiose and large scale, longevity and survival are predicated on recruitment. One...
This essay evaluates the effectiveness of NGO strategies to promote program sustainability using a case study of two NGOs that install biosand water filters in Cambodia. While the ownership-focused strategy of cost-sharing is the most commonly used and studied, there is evidence to suggest that certain more neglected strategies can...
Sound is a crucial aspect of the underwater environment for fishes – various species use sound to communicate, identify predators, navigate, and many other activities needed for survival in their habitat. Disruptions and disturbances in the natural soundscape can have important impacts on all these activities and are likely to...
The protagonists in the fiction of Paule Marshall, Alice Walker, and Toni
Morrison illuminate American cultural perceptions of black women and illustrate how the
creators of these characters hope to change those perceptions. I studied Paule Marshall's
Daughters, Alice Walker's Meridian and The Color Purple, and Toni Morrison's The
Bluest...
In this dissertation, I explore how women and men in later life experience the world of dating and the pursuit of new intimate relationships. Although the mortality gap between women and men at older ages is narrowing, as they enter their 70s, 80s, and 90s, there are still at least...
In this dissertation, I explored how social relationships influence, and are influenced by, men's experiences of caregiving to their aging parents. Because of sociodemographic trends such as fewer siblings in younger generations and the growth of women seeking professional careers, men are increasingly likely to be called upon to meet...
Diverse scientific fields collect multiple time series data to investigate the dynamical behavior of complex systems: atmospheric and climate science, geophysics, neuroscience, epidemiology, ecology, and environmental science. Identifying patterns of mutual dependence among such data generates valuable knowledge that can be applied either for inferential or forecasting purposes. Vector autoregressive...